Streetscapes/Astor Row on West 130th; In Harlem, Restoration of Rowhouses at Mid-Stage

By CHRISTOPHER GRAY

Published: October 9, 1994

THE New York Landmarks Conservancy's restoration of Astor Row, the little brick houses at 8 to 62 West 130th Street, is now at a middle stage, with some houses still almost derelict, some in mid-restoration and some completed.

But this half-done phase helps make it interesting, and a trip to one of the most memorable blocks in the city will repay anyone who makes the journey.

The Astor Estate, worth $80 million in the mid-1870's, began a particularly aggressive building program in 1878, eventually putting up structures like the old Waldorf-Astoria, the St. Regis and other big buildings. But it also built more modestly, and from 1880-1883 William Astor built 28 brick rowhouses for investment at 8 to 62 West 130th Street, designed by Charles Buek.

In 1883 The Real Estate Chronicle described them as "Philadelphia-style" and they are unique in Manhattan -- 14 pairs of houses set back 20 feet from the street, three stories high, with wooden porches and recessed light courts partly separating each pair. The intelligence and ingenuity of their planning rebukes the standard high-stoop brownstones built across the street.

In 1920 the row was still sound but buffeted by changing conditions. A real estate collapse in Harlem around 1905 had given blacks their first toehold in the neighborhood, previously almost exclusively white.

The 1920 census shows that Astor Row's tenants were all white. But in late 1920 the Astor Estate, headed by the young Vincent Astor, announced that it would open the houses to blacks, noting that the whites were on leases with 90-day cancellation clauses.

The exact reasoning behind the decision was not reported. One typical hypothesis is that whites fled areas next to those with blacks, but the 1920 census shows no empty houses. Another is that the quality of white tenants in such areas suffered, whereas the succeeding blacks were more respectable. But there were professionals in both white and black groups, and equal numbers operated their homes as rooming houses.

A final common explanation is that blacks paid more by crowding in. The black tenants may well have paid more, but they were not materially more crowded, with 316 tenants recorded in the 1925 state census, a modest increase over the 292 white tenants in 1920.

Whatever the explanation, the 1925 census offers a picture of black life. At 12 West 130th Street, the occupants were Joseph Bushnell, a 50-year-old minister;, his wife, Effie; their five children, and three lodgers: Thelma Hatcher, a teacher, Charles Hamlet, a bellman, and his wife, Iva. All were American-born.

In 46 West 130th Street, occupied by a machinist, Allen Abramson, and his wife, Mary, and several roomers, most of the occupants had come to this country from St. Kitts, St. Thomas or the Barbados since 1905. The youngest Astor Row inhabitant recorded in 1925 was Marion Walton at 32 West 130th Street, 106 days old, daughter of Wilbert Walton, a West Indian electrician who had been in America since 1919.

Astor Row was pretty much forgotten by 1978, when the second edition of the AIA Guide to New York City, by Norval White and Elliot Willensky, mourned the "restrained beauty which has been tarnished by years of economic distress," especially their fragile wooden porches, many of which were collapsing or had been removed.

IN 1981 the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the houses landmarks, but they continued their slide until 1990, when the New York Landmarks Conservancy began of one of the city's most unusual restoration projects.

Although the 28 houses are now mostly privately owned, some by occupants, some by investors, the Conservancy has collected $2.16 million for facade and interior repairs to 17 buildings. Of this money $375,000 is for low-interest loans, but the rest is outright grant money, about $100,000 per house.

Some are being restored by owner-occupants, some are being rebuilt into co-ops, and there's one "where we're still not sure who the homeowner is," says Peg Breen, president of the Conservancy. Later financing will cover other buildings, but the exterior work on most of the houses will be finished by 1995.

The project began in 1992, and now scaffolds and carpenters and other tradespeople dot Astor Row. The porch woodwork, originally painted in three different color combinations, is being repainted in a single uniform scheme of olive, white and gray.

The renovation has not been without problems, however. The Conservancy is prudently waiting to move ahead on houses that are still unoccupied. And it had a dispute with two homeowners over delays and financing.

Not many years ago there was something almost romantic for students of architecture discovering this ignored, tumble-down row. But this same romance was killing Astor Row, and in this case the drama of the steady reclamation is just as exciting.

Photos: The house at 26 West 130th Street, part of Astor Row, in 1939. The houses, many almost derelict, are being restored today by the New York Landmarks Conservancy. The project encompasses the buildings from 8 to 62 on the block just west of Fifth Avenue. (Office for Metropolitan History; Chris Maynard for The New York Times)